Fathers and Sons
by Llewellyn McEllis
Summary: A series of short reflections between Lee and Bill Adama about the responsibilities of fathers, the duties of sons, and the ties that bind family together.
1. Deny Thy Father

**Deny thy Father**

_Some have said that fathers never say the things they really want to. They stand by, stern-faced, unrelenting walls that wait for you to fall, to fail. When you're seven years old, they cross their arms over their chest and stand at your pyramid game as though there are a thousand far more important places they could be, should be. This game and you are a waste of time, and the minute you slip and fall, and the other kid on your team with the ball trips over you and loses the game, he's waiting, that emotionless wall shifting momentarily into disappointment._

Instead of clapping you on the back on the way home, and saying, "There'll be other games. . ." Instead of offering to take you for a consolation ice cream where all the other kids have gathered with their more enthusiastic parents, he says nothing. You sit in the passenger seat beside him and wonder if he'll ever forgive you, if he'll ever be able to look you in the eye and smile again.

When you get home, he tells your mother, "You missed one hell of a game," and for a moment you actually believe he's going to brag you up. Maybe he'll lie and tell her she should be proud of his potential, but instead he says, "Your son. . ."and he says that with the deepest contempt, as though he's already given up on you, denied you as his son. "Your son blew the whole frackin' game."

Fathers never say the things they should; they say the things they really want to. At least mine does. . .

Sunlight streamed down over her, shining off of her golden hair and creating something of a halo around her head. Lee paused in the corridor, one hand posed on the door, the other loose at his side as he watched the gentle, Caprican wind lift the small strands of her hair against her face. She reached up, the length of her white sweater hanging over her hand so that only the tips of her fingers came out to tuck away the hairs behind her ears. It had been awhile since he noticed just how beautiful she was, and abashed by his own bad behavior and negligence, he pressed through the door to meet her with an anxious and flirtatious grin.

"You took my breath away just now, you know?" He announced as he slid up and took her by surprise, his arms coming around her waist to draw her near. He breathed her in with the breeze, her hair smelling of honeysuckle and lavender flowers as she turned her cheek into his kiss. "I was standing in the doorway when I saw you out here waiting, and I. . . I don't know, it blew me away. I saw the most beautiful woman standing out here and then it hit me, that beautiful woman was mine."

"Lee," pinched her lips softly and rolled her eyes. "You know you've already won me."

"What?" The clever grin drew more deeply from the corners of his mouth. "Are you saying I should stop trying to charm you now?"

"Well, if you insist," she turned in his arms and snaked her arms around his neck, leaning inward to nuzzle the tip of her nose against his. "It is nice to know that even though you've already won me, you're still the most wonderful man I've ever met."

"And now you're trying to charm me," a chuckle shook his chest. He lowered his arms around her, drew her closer and managed to steal a kiss. "And let me say it's working wonders. So tell me," he stepped back, holding her at arm's length to look at her. "What's the big news?"

Her entire face beamed at the mention of her news, rivaling the very sun that shone down upon them. Her eyes blinked in nervous distraction, glancing away, but then back again. "I've had my suspicions for a couple of weeks now, but I wanted to be sure before I told you."

"Told me?" His own smile widened, and he tilted his head curiously. She leaned away, her grin growing larger, more playful. "Told me what? Come on, Gianne, all this secrecy is killing me."

"Lee, do you remember that night we came home from the fireworks, and it had been such a beautiful day, do you remember? It was like it was meant to be, and that night. . ." a long, dreamy sigh escaped her. "That night we made love, and though I have no complaints about our lovemaking there was something different about that night. . . it was. . . I don't know, magical."

It started in the pit of his stomach; a gripping terror that he thought for sure was going to drag him to his knees in relentless pain. His throat grew tighter, his breathing more difficult as a cold sweat broke out on his forehead and dripped down his temple in a single line. He knew exactly what night she was talking about, knew of the strange, magical feelings she spoke, but he had written them off as some coincidence, as just a really great night and nothing more.

"So then I was late last week, and I knew that something was off," she went on, that enthusiastic light still shining in her eyes. "The doctor ran all kinds of tests, and then this morning he called me." She paused there, as though the need for dramatic effect compelled her. Lee wanted to shake the words from her, to spill them out so he could wipe them away as easily as they'd come. Gianne bit down thoughtfully and drew her lower lip between her teeth. He watched as it slid through, leaving a faded pink where the pressure of her teeth had been. "Lee, we're pregnant."

Four syllables, three words—it felt like a blow to the gut, the wind knocked out of him the way it had been that day on the pyramid court. He'd stumbled, fallen forward and felt that painful loss and struggle from his own breath. Gianne kept talking, her animation and excitement fluttering outside of him like a moth beating its wings against an outdoor light in the darkness. She was gushing, spilling out all of her plans, her thoughts, her ideas. . . "and of course now we'll have to get married this summer. We simply can't bring a baby into the world out of wedlock. I mean, it's no small secret that we live together, but there are members of my family who would be horrified at the. . . Lee?"

The sound of his name drew him into his body, and he stepped back, lightly shaking his head. "No," he murmured softly.

The soft sound of Gianne's laughter battered against the hardness that stiffened him from the inside out. "We were already going to get married, silly."

"No," he said again. "Not that. It's the other. . ." he couldn't bring himself to say it. "What you said before."

"You mean about us being pregnant?"

He looked away from her as he drew even deeper into himself and struggled against his own breath. "About that. . ." he managed.

"You're not excited?" she withdrew too, now standing a space apart from him, her brow wrinkled with confusion. "I know we didn't plan this, but I mean. . ."

"You're right, we didn't plan this," stiffer and stiffer, he felt as though he was choking in his own shirt. He reached up, unbuttoned the collar and stretched his neck. "Gianne, we didn't even discuss this."

"Come on, Lee. We've been engaged two years. We're getting married in just six weeks," she pointed out. "So this came a little early."

"Early?" It should have never come at all, he wanted to shout. Who was he to think he could be any kind of proper father? His own father hadn't been around long enough to teach him anything about fatherhood, or what it meant. He imagined himself—awkward against the struggling cry of a small baby, and in his hands he saw that infant crumble to dust, some fault of his own inadequacy. "Gianne, no. We've never even discussed this."

"But it's part of the package, Lee," her blue eyes narrowed as her voice trembled between a mingling of fear and anger. "People get married, they have families. . ."

"Not me!" His teeth were clenched so tightly when he said those words that bits of spittle flew from his lips. "Don't you understand? Not me! I am not a family man, Gianne. I'm not fit to be anybody's father!"

She tilted her head at him, white-sweatered arms crossed over a defiant chest. The wisps of her blond hair still caught in the breeze seemed to whisper around her head—like a halo. "So what are you saying?"

"I'm saying no, Gianne." He looked away, the pain in her eyes stabbing through him like guilty splinters. "No!" The blood pulsed through him in dangerous rhythms. He could feel his hands swelling with it, with the unbalanced mingling between horror and refusal, between losing her and finding the strength to just hold on.

She was wringing her hands, twisting one inside the other, and though he wasn't sure why, or what she was doing until it was too late, the stun of what came next left him speechless. "We come together, Lee," there was a coldness in her voice unlike any he had ever heard before. "Without this baby, there is no me."

He swallowed, barely unaware of how cold his own gaze had grown. "Then I guess there is no us," he said in a dull tone he hardly recognized.

Gianne remained strong, her eyes unblinking though the tears in them wanting desperately to fall. She held her closed hand out to him, nudged his arm with her fist, "I can't believe that after two years with you, I only now discovered who you really were."

He looked away then, opening his hand to accept the returning of his gift to her. The metal was warm in his hand, but the stone was cold as the emptiness in her eyes then. "I'm sorry to disappoint you," he said.

Shaking her head, she spun quickly on heel and started away, down the steps beside them and rushing off into the sunlit afternoon. There was a part of him the longed to cry out to her, "Wait! Please, I'm sorry! I don't know what I've done, please, wait!" But he never opened his mouth, and Gianne never looked back.

Lee went on with his life over the next months. She did not call, but he thought of her, wondered how she was, where she was, if there was any chance at all for him to take it all back and embrace his fears, but it was too late. . . Like his own father had once done, he'd said the things he wanted to, instead of what was right, and in so doing, he alienated his own child before it was even born. Months later, while back in his father's company and under his command—Caprica long gone, Gianne and their unborn child long gone, the guilt would eat at him until there was nothing left inside him but a splinter of pain that festered with infection every time he looked at his own father.

There were some things a man couldn't prevent, no matter how hard he worked to avoid them. The son becomes the father, the father destroys the son, the cycle continues. 


	2. Laying Down the Law

Author's Notes: This moment takes place after Season 3 Episode 18/19, before the outcome of Gaius Baltar's trial. 

_The law. A man was not a man until he knew the law better than he knew himself. Knowing the law governed a man's choices and actions, and one who was knowledgeable in the inner-workings of the law could be counted on to influence and lead others. Drilled in the letters of it from the time they were old enough to think on their own, once they started reading they expected to study it harder, longer, until they were educated enough to hold intelligent conversations with him at the dinner table. He asked their opinion on current affairs, how they would judge situations if they were left to in charge of the outcome, and little did they know, sometimes their judgments touched his heart so much, they influenced the weight of his own._

It was innocence that governed over the guilty, innocence more capable of seeing the truth than guilt. But eventually the difference between right and wrong presented itself to them on playgrounds, in classrooms, even in their own household. After that they became tainted, and their opinions didn't matter anymore. He had nothing to say to them; they were no longer important.

The son grew to loathe the law, though he understood its importance and necessity, and instead of rushing into law school as his father always assumed he would, he rushed off to war in hopes of becoming a hero. The father never forgave the son, but the cold exterior the son shone remained unaffected. When the military no longer needed him, he was cast out, and the bitter father smirked. The law would never let a man down. . .

But the military had its own laws, its own codes, and loyalty was among its greatest assets. . .

Bill sat on the edge of her bed watching her sleep. The small slats of artificial light shone down on her face, illuminating the dark circles beneath her unmoving eyes. Even on the verge of her own end, she was incredibly beautiful, one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen. There were times when he still liked to close his eyes and picture her on the deck of the cabin they had imagined together. She wore only a white bathrobe, and cupped in her hands was a steaming mug of some herbal concoction. When he came upon her in this daydream she was looking out over the deep green lake, watching some water fowl glide across the surface. Sometimes he could actually smell the earth, and the essence of fir trees as though a lakeside breeze had wafted up to meet him.

It was a beautiful dream. A dream he did not share, though he imagined it might somehow lighten the weight of the colonies she seemed all too ready to carry on her shoulders. He reached out and took her hand in his, stroked the top, the lengths of her fingertips, and even when awareness of his touch curled her fingers around his, he didn't pull away.

"You should be resting," the gravel of his voice whispered in the half-light.

"I am resting," she replied, the smile of her voice reaching out to lift his spirits. "Besides, I feel much more secure knowing I have such an agile guard at my bedside."

Bill said nothing. Sometimes there were no words, and in a lifetime filled with strange misunderstandings, Laura had come to be one of the few he knew that understood the value of silence. Her curled fingers squeezed his gently, and then she lifted her other hand to lay it over top of his. Together they sat in complete quiet, the sound of their breathing the only thing between them for quite some time.

She patted the top of his hand. "You shouldn't be angry with him," she finally said.

It was amazing to him how easily she read him sometimes, the furious thoughts of Lee's tactless behavior during the trial flashing red inside his mind. "He resigned," was his only reply.

"You didn't let him," she wondered. "Did you?"

He cleared his throat and looked down. "I think I did one worse," he admitted. "He said he couldn't serve under a commander who questioned his integrity," He explained. "I told him it was more than just a question. I don't think he has any."

"Bill," her scolding tone cut through him the way it always did. "I don't agree with his decisions anymore than you, and I certainly had no intentions of revealing my condition publicly, but you can't blame him for doing what he thinks is right."

The sound of his own laughter shocked him. "This from the woman who I know for a fact would have no qualms throwing Baltar out the nearest airlock."

"I started all of this, Bill. I should have known how passionately it would consume him. He's so much like his father." It was a double-edge compliment, both praising his true integrity while questioning his ultimate stubbornness.

"I think we're both at equal fault," he admitted. "I gave him my father's old books," he said. "I thought it would inspire him, but there was something I forgot about the law. . . something I learned long ago as a child."

Her soft caress moved up his forearm, and he shivered at the growing familiarity of her touch. 

"What was that?"

He paused for a moment, tried to put his assessment into proper words, and then he sighed. "While the worlds of men cry out for law and government, all too often it is a man's private beliefs and experiences that govern his choices. I have a sick feeling in me that Lee's going to call into question the injustice of our entire system, the lack of honor and reliability in our fallen government."

Though he couldn't see her face, Bill imagined the prospect had frightened her, as the movement of her hand stopped. "It scares me to think that all we've carried with us from the colonies might one day disappear," she admitted. "Our laws, our traditions. . . These are such strange times, Bill. Who is going to show our children the difference between right and wrong?"

Bill Adama tilted his head just a little, the truth sinking into him the way it had done when he was just a boy. "These are hard times," he agreed, lifting his hand now in comfort over hers. "But our children have been through the hardship too. They are strong," he paused for a moment," stronger than we think they are. They'll make their own choices, I suppose. It'll be up to them in the end to decide what's right and what's wrong."

"What if they make the wrong choices?" There was a catch of fear in her hesitant voice, as though she worried saying the words out loud would make it come to pass.

"We can only hope our influence weighs in their hearts," he said. "And that they turn to us for guidance when they can't find the way."

It was so easy in theory, easy to say, he realized, but he could never so easily give that kind of freedom to Lee, no matter how hard his son worked, how agilely he handled every task that was thrown at him. He could only hope in his heart that Lee was strong enough to find the truth on his own, and strong enough to forgive a stubborn old man in the end. 


	3. The Brother's Game

The Brother's Game 

_We grew up believing that all families lived like ours—that mothers were sad creatures who hovered between habitual silence and outright bitterness, while fathers stayed away on active duty serving the colonies. There were nights that I laid awake listening to my younger brother as he tried to hide his sobs of anguish after having found himself at the brunt of one of her senseless tirades. It wasn't until later, much later, when we were nearly grown, that they were no longer married, and we hadn't seen our father in more years than I wanted to count, that I realized she hid her sorrows inside a bottle, and took her anger out on us._

I believed then that it was his fault. At fourteen I reasoned that the destruction of our youthful joy was all because of how selfishly he threw himself out of our family and into his career, but now I wonder if she didn't drive him away. There is one moment in my mind that stands out. We were vacationing in this cabin overlooking a green lake, and as we were coming back from an afternoon of fishing on the lake, we found her standing with her lips pursed tight, her eyes narrowed, and that night Zak and I laid awake listening to them fight.

It was our fault. Even then I knew it. It was us or her, he couldn't love us both, she wouldn't let him, so instead of dying to try and please her, he left us all.

Lee heard them the moment he stepped into the bar, Kara Thrace's raucous laughter clawing all the way to the back of the bar at anyone who dared enter. He nodded as he passed by several familiar faces, and then stopped at the bar to order a round of shots for the table in the back, and a beer for himself.

"If you want to have a seat, I'll send Cindy right over with that, Lieutenant." 

Lee nodded, smiled, and started toward the table. _Lieutenant._ He still couldn't get used to the sound of it, but he couldn't deny the pride or the smile that consumed him every time he heard it.

The group saw him coming, and Zak was the first to stand up, his beer held upright, spilling foam into a puddle on the table as he thrust it into the air. "Lieutenant Adama!" He shouted.

The small group around the table lifted their drinks and cried, "Lieutenant!"

Everyone else in the bar turning their focus in their direction. The pride swelled, and for a moment Lee could barely stand from embarrassment and joy.

"That's enough guys," he lifted his leg across the chair and sunk down into the only empty seat at the table. "You're swelling my head here. I won't be able to fit through the door."

Cindy shuffled up to the table with a tray full of shots. She leaned in and started laying them out, announcing, "This round's on the Lieutenant."

Once more, they lifted their drinks and rowdily cried out, "Lieutenant!"

Kara was the first to slam her shot, the glass bottom of the glass crashing down on the table, and Zak followed just as quickly, determined to at least impress his overzealous instructor, if he couldn't keep up with her. Lee held his own shot up, nodded once at the group, and then he gulped down the shot, ignoring the burn of liquor crawling down his throat and into his belly. He leaned in and plunked the glass down on the table, and then slid into an open seat on the end of the curved bench.

"So, Lee," Kara leaned in on his left, as his position had somehow managed to separate Zak and Kara, putting one on each side of him. "Your lips have got to be numb from all that ass kissing, right?"

"Frack you," he nudged her off his arm. 

"No way, man!" Zak pressed in from the right, his beer thrust forward as he shook his finger at her. "Not my brother. You've seen him fly. He's a frackin' natural."

Her silvery eyes flashed across the table, and for a moment it was beyond obvious the attraction between the two of them. Lee only hoped Zak knew what he was doing, getting involved with his flight instructor. The slightest indiscretion could cost them both everything, and if they broke up during training, she might be inclined to use her influence to damage his career.

That word, career, it made Lee shudder every time he thought about it in relation to his younger brother. Zak had always been the sports star, the pyramid champion. He'd gone to college on a full scholarship and could have played professionally, but just as Lee had done, Zak learned early on that pyramid did not impress their father. Flying, on the other hand, now that got Bill Adama's attention. But Zak was definitely not cut out for the military, and he was even less likely to cut it as a pilot.

_"There is a whole universe of opportunity out there, Zak! You could do anything," Lee tried to convince him._

Sensitive and equally competitive, he leapt to the challenge with a vengeance. "What? You don't think there is room in our family for more than one star pilot?" It had been the first time they'd really argued since they were teens. "You know I'd kill to have Dad look at me the way he looks at you now. You've finally got him to notice you, Lee."

"This isn't about Dad, Zak, it's about being who you are, not what someone else expects of you!"

"I am being who I am," he insisted. "I am a pilot, just like you. Just like our father."

"How's training?" Lee glanced over at Zak.

Kara excused herself from the table and walked across the bar to the jukebox. Lee watched her for a moment, noticing the way she nearly arced across the jukebox, stretching her frame to conform to the curve as she read through the songs.

Zak jabbered on beside him, something about how well he was doing, how he was going to pass his test with flying colors, how proud their father would be.

Lee shook his head, and lifted the mug of beer to his lips. He sunk them into the foam head on top for a moment, and then took a drink. "So you're still doing this for him?" He lowered the mug to the table and turned his head to look at his brother. "When are you going to start living for yourself, Zak? Stop worrying so much about what he wants from you?"

"It's all for me, Lee, trust me," he insisted. "Earning his respect and attention is just a bonus. I have never wanted anything more in my life." It was then that he lifted his gaze across the barroom, and Lee followed that gaze, his eyes on Kara Thrace again. "I'm going to ask her to marry me," he announced in a tone that only Lee was meant to hear. "After I take my pilot's test, that way it doesn't look like some kind of bribe, but I'm going to ask her to marry me."

Taken aback for a moment by the suddenness of his brother's confession, Lee couldn't take his eyes off of Kara. She had dropped coins into the jukebox, and was now waving her arms in some excited dance that seemed to accentuate the femininity she often brushed aside in lieu of her position as a trainer. She was dancing toward the table, nothing fancy or exotic, and yet her focus and movement was incredibly erotic. Lee felt the hairs on the back of his neck raise, and as she approached he swallowed the tension that had settled in his neck.

"Come on, baby," she held a hand out to Zak. "Wooo! Let's dance!"

Zak jumped up from the table without a second thought and took her outstretched hand. They danced onto the floor, and Lee watched them. He would never admit that he was envious, though there was a certain closeness and familiarity between Kara Thrace and his brother that he had never quite felt with anyone he had ever been intimate with. Sure, there were girls, even a few he'd been overly fond of, but he was sure he'd never looked at any girl the way his brother looked at Kara Thrace.

And Zak was going to marry her. . .

Lee imagined that his brother's future was going to turn out just fine. All of the worry and anxiety he carried for his younger brother was nothing more than the overprotective sibling looking out for the little one. Zak was all grown up now. He had his whole life ahead of him, his future, and when he passed his pilots test, he was right. Their father would finally notice him, and he would certainly notice his fine choice in women to boot. He would be facing their father with two assets in his corner, and for a moment Lee was jealous. All he'd ever done to impress their father was make Lieutenant, and he'd done that completely for himself. Zak—Zak was so driven to please their father that Lee had to wonder if even his choice in young women wasn't geared to impress the man both of them had grown outwardly embittered toward over the years.

He followed the sound of Kara's laughter to the dance floor, where Zak had taken it upon himself to invent new dance moves to the tribal revival song that had followed her requested piece. They looked ridiculous out there on the dance floor, shaking their bodies and leaping up and down without anything but the beat to guide their movement. Despite his naive motivations to impress their father, Zak's whole life seemed to follow that same pattern—some out of control rhythm with no moves, and yet no matter what he did, it always seemed to work out fine.

Swilling the last few gulps of beer in his mug, Lee rose from the table and waved to his brother before dropping a tip on the table. He started for the door, looking back over his shoulder one last time to the place where his brother and the woman he loved dictated their own moves in a world that Lee had always believed called for structure and planning.

He would never tell Zak as much, but he envied him.


	4. The Thing Is

The thing is…

The thing is, he was just like his father. It was one of the things she had always admired about him, why she wanted to marry him in the first place. Not because she was in love with his father, but because his father was stable, secure… a sure thing. He was honorable, noble and he had been like a father to her ever since she'd stepped up to serve him on Galactica.

Lee liked to pretend he was a rebel, a force wrought to destroy all of his father's ideals, to punish the man behind those ideals, but the thing is, those same ideals that he would diminish have set the course for his own life. Those very ideals were what made her fall in love with him, even though she knew he was in love with someone else.

But during those long months they were alone together on Pegasus Lee loved _her_. He listened to her, talked to her, dreamed with her. There were no distractions, and when they made love he was really there. Something had changed, and the thing is, she let herself believe during that time that she had won. But it was Lee who changed.

He became soft, and not in any way that she could later look back on in fondness. No, the soft-hearted man she had fallen in love with had hardened his heart, and his body paid the price. They were partners, yes. Man and wife. Commander and lieutenant. Lee and Dee. But the thing is, they were never really lovers. Not the way they should have been. He was there with her, but he was always a million miles away.

And she endured because she had hope. Hope that one day he would look at her and see Dee. But the thing is, she knows where his heart really lies, and she can't wait around anymore for it to find its way back to her. Not when there is nothing left to look forward to. Not when they are standing so close to the edge.


End file.
